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SPEECH 

OF 

HON. S. S. tM, OE OHIO, 

n 

ON 

TERRITORIAL EXPANSION. 



•. 



DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JANUARY IS, 1S59. 

The House being in Committee of the "Whole on the state of the Union — 
Mr. COX said: 

Mr. Chairman : I would not have sought the floor when I did, had I not been 
expecting daily a telegraphic dispatch which would have called me home, and 
perhaps unfitted me for saying what I wished, in relation to the questions of a 
foreign nature connected with our territorial expansion. 

There is a logic in history which is as inexorable as fate. A -writer in the 
time of the flrst Stuart, gave as the number of the kingdoms of Christendom, 
five-and-twenty. But there was no mention of three of the principal nations, 
Russia, Austria, and Prussia, in their present condition; nor of twelve other 
nations out of the twenty now enumerated in Europe; nor of the thirty petty 
sovereignties now extant in Germany. Within two centuries, the transatlantic 
continent has changed its territory and rulers beyond all the caprices of fancy ; 
yet by a law as fixed as that which returns the seasons or rolls the stars. 

The disquieting aspect of cisatlantic politics signifies the consummation of 
territorial changes on this continent, long predicted, long delayed, but as certain 
as the logic of history! 

Some of these changes in Europe have been through decay, dissolution, and 
disintegration. Spain was once the Peru and Mexico of the Old World. The 
ancestors of the hidalgo were enslaved in the mines of Spain by Rome and Car- 
thage. But now, Leon, Aragon, Castile, Navarre, Toledo, Galicia, and Granada, 
once separate kingdoms, have lost their isolated glory, and are only known as 
the props of the " worm-eaten throne of Spain." The stronger races of Europe 
have consolidated their power by extending its sphere and absorbing the weaker 
neighboring nations. England, Ireland, and Scotland, by union, have trans- 
planted their colonies and multiplied their strength ; and Russia has clasped the 
half of Europe and Asia in its strong embrace, until, from the furthest West we 
perceive the conflict of their civilization in the furthest Eastl 

These are but illustrations of a law from which America is not exempt. Not 
more surely will northern Africa, and indeed the countries whose boundaries 
are coincident with the Mediterranean, become French; western and north rn 
Asia become Russian ; and southern and central Asia become English, than this 
continent become American ! The law which commands this is higher law than 
congressional enactment. If we do not work with it, it will work in spite of 
us. This law may be expressed thus : 

TJtat the weaker and disorganized nations must be absorbed by the strong and 
organized nation. Nationalities of inferior grade must surrender to those of su- 
perior civilization and polity 1 

Whether the races of this continent be in a tribal condition, as are our Indians ; 
in a semi-civilized and anarchical condition, as are the Central and South Ameri- 

Printed by Lemuel Towers. 






can and Mexican races, they must obey this law of political gravitation. This 
law drives them to the greater and more illustrious State for protection, happi- 
ness, and advancement. Whether the United States go and take them, or they 
come and ask to be taken, no matter. They must whirl in ; throw off their 
nebulous and uncertain form, and become crystalized into the higher forms of 
civilization. 

The largest expression of this law of annexation, is: That no nation has the 
right to hold soil, virgin and rich, yet unproducing; no nation has a right to 
hold great isthmean highways, or strong defences, on this continent, without 
the desire, will, or power, to use them. They ought, and must, inure to the 
advancement of our commerce. They must become confiscate to the decrees of 
Providence! 

In carrying out these designs, we have, from time to time, added territory 
from France, Spain, and Mexico. "We have endeavored to add other territory, 
which the jealousy of France, Spain, and especially of England, has prevented. 
It is not my purpose now to rehearse our history in this regard. We may have 
kept step with our interests and our destiny; but at this juncture, standing on 
the threshold of this new year, we are only marking time, not moving forward! 
It is well to inquire whether there is not now upon us, as the assembled expres- 
sion of this nation, a peculiar duty with respect to this element of our progress. 
My judgment is, that we are to-day, derelict. We are not up to the enterprise 
of the nation. If we consider just now the elements of our people, martial, 
mechanical, intellectual, agricultural, and political, who will doubt but that 
there are a dozen locomotive Republics already fired up and ready for move- 
ment ? 

The Executive has done his duty. He has boldly followed out his Ostend 
ideas. He has urged upon us a duty, which being undone, leaves him power- 
less, and leaves the national enthusiasm and expansion a prey to adventurous 
raids and seditious propagandists. Had the Thirty -Fourth Congress aided Presi- 
dent Pierce in the Black Warrior matter, we should now have representatives 
from Cuba on this floor ! . 

The President ha3 called our attention to the territory upon our south. Not 
New Granada — she will come in time. Not Venezuela — she is even yet more 
vital than New Granada ; but the country north of these, and lying between 
them and us, must be absorbed. For this absorption we must contend, not so 
much with the people, whose interests will be enhanced by the absorption, but 
with Spain, France, and England, who have no interests comparable witli our 
own. These interests and antagonisms I propose to consider in this order: First, 
Cuba; second, Central America ; third, Mexico. j 

As to Cuba, the reasons for its acquisition are well understood by the country. 
The message has succinctly and ably presented them. Its geographigal position 
gives to the nation which holds it, unless that nation be very weak, a coign of 
vantage as to which self-preservation forbids us to be indifferent. Our Missis- 
sippi, foreign, and coast-wise trade, now $250,000,000, and in five years to be 
500,000,000, are within its compass. While the island is of little use to Spain, 
save as a source of revenue, it is to us of incalculable advantage. The nature 
of the colonial office in Cuba — its power to harm us remedilessly, unless we go 
to Madrid for remedy ; and the final stopping of the slave trade, are reasons 
r^ed by the President. Our unsettled claims, and the many other difficul- 
ties growing out of our relations to Spain, demand settlement, but receive none. 

How long shall we continue in this condition ? During the pleasure of Spain ? 
Is there no redress? Is our every attempt to be construed into a usurpation? 
What impediments have we to meet ? There is one which has einee Mr. Adams' 
time, proved insurmountable — Spanish pride. It is well said by an old poet, 
that — 

" Spain gives us pride, which Spain of all the earth 
May freely give, nor fear herself a dearth." 

Since then, there has been no curtailment of that pride. True, Spain has now 
little to be proud of but her recollections. Poor, sensitive, corrupt, she holds 
to the punctillio of diguity without its substantial energy. If Spain will not 



sell Cuba to us, because she feels that she will thereby Bell her honor, we must 
insist on her changing its policy. She should keep the island aloof from French 
intervention. She should preserve its independence. 

Above all, Spain should abolish her present infamous tariff. Her export 
tariff is an anomaly in commerce, and her tariff on imports is still more bar- 
baric. Her export duty, which is a direct tax on the producer of her sugars 
and tobacco,* does not 60 much affect us, as the tax which she loads on our flour, 
pork, beef, and lard. We have tried in vain by diplomacy to unloosen these 
shackles. Nothing but the sword can cut them off. 

Up to 1809, Spain imposed restrictions on Cuba, by which no trade at all 
was allowed with any foreign nation. After this, and on the revival of the 
Spanish merchant-marine, the differential duty on goods imported iu foreign 
bottoms was enacted. It was intended to crush out the trade with the United 
States. This continued till 1834, when this Congress passed rataliatory laws. 
No countervailing acts, however, could move the meanness of Spanish restriction. 
American flour and other staples for which Cuba must look to a foreign mar- 
ket, are excluded. Thus a balance of trade, averaging $10,000,000 per year, 
is kept constantly against us. The duty in Cuba on flour imported from Spain 
is only $2 50 per barrel ; from the United States, in American or other foreign 
bottoms, it is $10 81. So that, if flour be worth five dollars in Cincinnati, the 
cost to the Cuban consumer is sixteen dollars per barrel! This enormous tax on 
flour prevents it's use in the island, except by the wealthy few — the thirty-five 
thousand Spaniards. The body of the poor and oppressed Creoles are com- 
pelled to use the dry and insipid Cassava root as a substitute for bread. This 
tariff on flour, added to an infamous tonnage-tax, operates as a prohibition on 
flour. Y\ ith a moderate duty, or if Cuba were annexed, this consumption, as 
it is estimated by our economists, would be a million of barrels ! It'would be 
enjoyed by us exclusively — inure to the benefit of the farmers of my State and 
yours. That is evident from the fact, that no other country could compete with 
us in that staple; for no other country is so near to Cuba, or so prolific in 
breadstuffs. 

We exported to Cuba, in 1857, only 45,145 barrels of flour, worth $324,410 ; 
in 1858, 17,905 barrels, worth $105,009. Of other articles, beef, pork, lard, 
hams, and bacon, and including flour, we had, in 1857, but Sl,86S,783; in 
1858, but §1,228,119. Whereas, had a liberal commercial economy, like that 
of Belgium, Holland, or Great Britain obtained, we should have had, at least, 
$10,000,000 of produce exported. This would nearly have balanced our trade 
in sugar and coffee, and on these we have fixed no prohibitive tariff! Thus our 
commerce is crippled under the blows of this Spanish oppression. Why even 
the Spanish Crown would be better helped, by a more liberal policy. Such a 
system in this era of commercial freedom, is a shame to civilization, aud if inter- 
national law were rightly written, it would, itself, be a cause of honorable war ! 

But I have little hope that Spain will sell Cuba, or that the Cubans under- 
stand the nature of the blessings which attend annexation. They will not per- 
ceive that they become, by annexation, coequal with New York and Ohio, in a 
common league for the common weal. They fear for their church and domes- 
tic institutions, as if they were any part of Federal concernment. 

I was surprised to meet an impediment raised by a distinguished Senator 
from Srath Carolina in his Barnwell speech. I trust it is not shared by many 
southern men. He objects to taking Cuba ; first, because it may involve a war, 
whose consequences he states to be fearful. He leaves us in doubt as to these 
consequences. Does he mean the reduction of Cuba to the condition of Hayti ? 
A terrible consequence. That might follow ; but that is rather an English than 
a Spanish threat, and hardly capable of execution in a time when Spain and 
France are reviving the slave trade to cheapen tropical produce. His second 
objection is more salient I quote it entire: 

" If we had Caba, we could not make more than two or three slave States there, which 
would not restore the equilibrium of the North and the South ; while, with the African slave 
trade closed, and her only resort to this continent, she would, besides erushiu<r out our whole 
sugar culture by her competition, afford in a few years a market for all the slaves in Missouri, 
Kentucky, and Maryland. She is, notwithstanding the exorbitant taxe9 imposed on her, capa- 
ble now of apsorbing the annual increase of all the slaves oil this continent, and consumes, it 
Is said, twenty or thtrty thousand a year by her system of labor. Slaves decrease there large- 



ly. In time, under the system practiced, every slave m America m.^al De exierunuaieu in 
Cuba as were the Indians. However the idle African may procreate in the tropics, it yet re- 
mains to be proven, and the facts are against the conclusion, that he can, iu those regions, work 
and thrive. It is said Cuba is to be ' Africanized,' rather than that the United States should 
take her. That threat, which at one time was somewhat alarming, is no longer any cause of 
disquietude to the South, after our experience of the Africanizing of St. Domingo and Jamaica. 
"What have we lost by that? I think we reaped some benefit; and if the slaves of Cuba are 
turned loose, a great sugar culture would grow up in Louisiaua and Texas, rivalling that of 
cotton, and diverting from it so much labor that cotton would rarely be below its present 
price." 

This objection is two-fold. The inter-state slave trade with Cuba, in case 
of annexation, he thinks, would make several free States, by the demand and 
consumption of negroes ; and even if it would not, Cuba would not give the 
South the preponderance in the Union ; and secondly, sugar he thinks, would be 
cheap to the whole Union ; while a few thousand sugar planters, who just 
thrive on the bounty they now get, would be ruined. As to the argument 
about Kentucky, Missouri, and Maryland, becoming free through Cuban annex- 
ation, I leave that to the members from those States. As to the sugar, I say, 
that an argument of that kind addressed to a free-trade people by a free trader, 
should go far to weaken the morale of his great and frank speech, as it does the 
economy of his politics. To the people of my State, such an argument will 
quicken their ambition to acquire Cuba ; not alone because of the millions to be 
gained by an increase of our exports thither, which are taxed prohibitively ; 
but because we pay a tax on Cuban sugar, which is harsh, protective, and in- 
defensible, in any epoch of a depressed exchequer. In 1857, there were, in all, 
of sugar and molasses, imported from Cuba into the United States, $40,093,46(5 
worth. The tariff on these sugars was $12,02S,039 80. Ohio paid one-tenth 
of this, or about twelve hundred thousand dollars, which is equal to her im- 
mense school tax, and nearly half a million more than she pays for her State 
government, and nearly one-half of the expenses of all her counties. By our 
tariff of 1857, we reduced the tax on sugar six per cent, and the panic reduced 
the importation enormously. During the year ending June 30, 1S5S, our su- 
gars from Cuba amounted to only $18,020,022, giving a revenue of $4,48S,S05 28, 
at twenty-four per cent, ad valorem. 

Since 1847, when Mr. Polk proposed annexation, this nation must have paid 
over sixty millions sugar tax! Ohio has paid of that sum $5,000,000. My dis- 
trict has paid one-twentieth part of $6,000,000, or $300,000; an annual tax of 
$30,000 — all for what? That one of the prime necessaries of life should be 
fostered into premature growth, to aid a few sugar planters in the South ! If 
•Cuba cannot be annexed, to break this servility, by which the many are made 
tributary to the few, then we must remodel our Democracy and economy. My 
State Legislature, in 1854, passed a resolution, at my solicitation, requesting 
Congress to abate this tax. There is no reason for its existence. 

"But," it is said, "we must protect Texas and Louisiana in their few sugar 
plantations! If Cuba comes in, away goes the tax!" Every man, woman, and 
child, iii my State, will say: "Away with it! Welcome Cuba and free sugarl" 
" But," says the Senator, "if Cuba be Africanized and kept out, it will keep up 
;the price of sugar, and a great growth will spring up, rivaling cotton." What 
rthen ? Ecstacy 1 " Negroes will be in demand. Cotton, too, will be kept 
"high I" What an argument for a Senator of all the United States, every one of 
whose interests are his own! The Union is a cotton-pod! [Laughter.] ItB 
growth dependent on the growth of the cane! If, by this logic, Cuba is to be 
kept out, let us know it. Already the republican mouth grows juicy at the 
prospect with Cuba in the Union! [Laughter.] It matters not if sugar be 
made by slaves. That little delicacy of Exeter-Ball sentimentality is becoming 
obsolete. Even our Quakers are willing to drink cheap damnation in their 
coffee-cups, and eat it on their buckwheats! 

My most distinguished constituent, the Governor of my State, and a candidate 
for the Presidency, will soon outvie your southern Hotspurs in the race of an- 
nexation, if thus you dress your laggard logic. In a speech at a Yankee festival 
in my city, where the Pilgrims were praised for many a virtue which they had 
not and 'their intolerable intolerance was glossed over by the fervor of the 
hour Governor Chase is reported to have advocated the policy of " leaving to 



every one the absolute control of all matters of domestic concernment," and an 
" indefinite expansion of empire." If this does not include Cuba, I will ask his 
friends opposite, to say what is excluded by his concluding remark, that as the 
last result of the enlarging empire both of American Government and American 
principles, he summons "the parliament of man to sit on the destinies of th& 
world?" 

I did not dream that I should ever have to welcome the Ohio aspirant for the 
White House into the support of its present occupant. I did not dream last fall 
that I should represent him so nearly. I warn gentlemen of the South to observe 
these signs, and prevent this grand larceny of Democratic thunder, by consid- 
ering the proposition which some gentleman last session called national grand 
larceny 1 Call it by what name you will, I am ready to answer the call of the 
President, if for nothing else, for thejbenefit of our $250,000,000 of yearly trade, 
which must pass under the range of Cuban cannon. I am ready to vote for the 
bill of the gentleman of North Carolina, [Mr. Branch,] looking to the ; urchase 
of Cuba; and I am not very particular as to the amount of money with which 
to fill the blank in his bill. In case of our failure to purchase by honorable 
negotiation, I would favor its seizure in case of foreign war, or of a European 
intervention. 

As to Central America, I do not desire to enter so fully into our relations with 
this region. That has been ably done by my friend from Virginia, [Mr. Jenkins.] 
We know well the impediment existing in the way of our acquisition there. 
The Claytou-Bulwer treaty — the diplomatic blunder of the century — stands as 
a huge gorgon in our path. The policy of its abrogation is conceded ; but "how 
not to do it," seems to have been the practice. The present Executive in his 
message of December 8, 1857, bewailed this condition of things. He inherited, 
as did President Pierce, this treaty of peace, which has proved a treaty of 
offense. England and the United States have been quarreling over its con- 
struction, when its destruction was the most pacific course that could Lave been 
adopted. Collateral treaties may be made which will prevent the cons -quench 
of an abrupt abrogation of this treaty. Diplomacy is now, we are told, work- 
ing to this end. 

But there is in the American mind a chronic distrust of England. It is well 
grouuded in her laxity of faith. When her interests can be subserved, she 
breaks any compact; and only adheres to it when demanded by her interests. 
Whether "the treaties to be made with Honduras, Costa Pica, and Nicaragua, 
throttle this bantling of Bulwer, whether we are to lose still more by British 
dilatory diplomacy, remains to be seen. One thing is remarkable, that we have 
not advanced since 1849, when Nicaragua, in the Hiess-Selva treaty, proposed 
to "confer onus the exclusive right" of an interoeeanic canal, or highway. 
Had that treaty been confirmed, we might have had to-day forts an 1 free eitie3 
along its route and at its termini, with full right to protect Nicaragua by all 
the strength of our Navy and Army. A year later, and that wily diplomatist 
Bulwer— v. ho, for hi-; tact, is sent to the Bosphorous to teach Russia her role 
in the East — comes forward with his projd. Our Government nibble »yly at 
his bait; but, like a foolish fish, at last leaps for the fly, is barbed, and hauled 
in to flounder for the amusement of the world. Would that Mr. Cla] ton had 
weighed the meaning of Smelfungus's philosophy : "It is always tim to cut 
your throat; but if your throat is once cut, there are certain difficulties in the 
way of reconsidering your determination." From that time till now, ■.have 
been following Mrs. Chick's advice to Dombey, "making an effort" to get rid 
of this incubus. 

Cramptonand Webster tried in 1852 to unravel the web. Then •".lister 
and Molina tried it, with the aid of Costa Rica. Then Wheeler and 
anting fi ,■ STiearagua, made an effort, which our Government failed to accept. 
Then Clarendon and. Herran, for Honduras, sought to untie the knot; and this 
led the way ;<> the Oass-Trisarri treaty in the fall of 1857, which began ' 
Then, a fair treat le, allowing us the protectorate of the transit ; but 

through foreign influence it was so modified by Nicaragua as to be unacceptable 
to onr Government Now, Sir Gore Ouseley, having ceased to b ■ 



myth here, has gone to the South, -where, we trust, something may be clone to 
cancel that part of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty by which "we agreed with Eng- 
land to cut our throats, by never "occupying, fortifying, or colonizing, or as- 
suming, or exercising any dominion over Nicaragua, Costa Rica, the Mosquito 
coast, "or any part of Central America." We trust that such an agreement may 
be made to this end; but my reading of history is vain, if we do not find 
thrown about this abrogation some clog which the American people will not 
bear. 

The truth is, that we have slept so long, and dreamed so transportingly of our 
destiny over these regions, that meanwhile Japan and China are opened ; Fra- 
zer's river becomes an Eldorado; and English and French navies, quitting the 
attempt on Cronstadt, and tiring of the red storm of the Euxine, display their 
guns on this continent. Their entente cordiale, as Clarendon said it would be, 
is extended to this hemisphere ; and here we have them ! They are, by their 
presence, if not by their diplomacy, ignoring the far-famed doctrine of Mr. 
Monroe, which had, when first given, as general a meaning and as practical a 
use, as it ought now to have a specific application. His doctrine was, that the 
American continents by the free and independent condition which they have 
assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future 
colonization or influence by any European Power. 

Let controversy contend as to the meaning of this doctrine. I know that 
when Yucatan was about to be taken by England, and when English arms were 
furnished her for an independency of Mexico, which would have been a depen- 
dency on England, Mr. Calhoun then tried, in an able speeh, to limit the appli- 
cation of that doctrine to the surroundings out of which it grew, namely, to 
the intervention of the holy alliance to recover the revolted American States 
for Spain, and the Russian occupation on our northwest. But the declaration 
has a larger meaning. It has become settled policy. In 1823, Mr. Jefferson 
tersely laid it down thus: 

" Oar first and fundamental maxim should be, never to entangle ourselves in the broils of 
Europe ; our second, never to suffer Europe to intermeddle wiih cisatlantic affairs." 

Yet this doctrine is 6neered at, as if Monroe's ghost were invoked to do a kind 
of constable's duty, to warn all foreign intruders from this continent. So far 
as emigration is concerned, this continent is open as day ; but no flag, no policy, 
no institution, no colonies, no protectorates of Europe, can exist here, without 
endangering the peace, infringing the rights, or disturbing the order and pro- 
spective interests of this continent. Whatever may have been the occasion of 
the Monroe declaration, its cause is a3 eternal as liberty, and its consequences 
will be as progressive as our nation. I care not for its traditionary emphasis. 
Democrats, at least, can afford to let that go. Is it sound doctrine for the pre- 
sent? If so, it ought to be the enthusiastic sentiment and genius of this Gov- 
ernment. If so, let it be no more the jeer of Europe, the swagger of America, 
but a fact as much a part of our historic life as the Declaration of Independence, 
which was its procreant source. That doctrine is the law of self-preservation. 
General Cass, in his recent letter, has given it proper direction. That doctrine 
was intended to guard this continent against the incursion of any alliances, 
"holy" or unholy. It looked to that law which I have laid down, by which 
the interests and honor of this hemisphere were to be guarded by none but 
ourselves. We do not want to be foreclosed against its occupation, fortification, 
and annexation. In the present feeling of this country, no treaty can be made 
and made to stand, if it does not break down all protectorates of England and 
all interference of France. The Senate of the United States dare not confirm 
such a treaty. The present Executive will not present it. The present Secre- 
tary of State will not sanction it. 

Does England want Honduras, Yuoatan, the Belize ? What are they to her ? 
Nothing; except as she can use them to block up the progress of this nation. 
Does she want free passage over the Central American States? That she can 
have under our auspices and with safety! What does she with the Valorous 
and the Leopard in the Carribean sea? Why do her officers spy for arms in the 
American steamer Washington? Is it only fillibusters she is after ? I do dia- 



trust her. If she seems to acquiesce in our view for a time, may we not attri- 
bute it to that popular will which compels her aristocracy to more prudence in 
reference to America ? She pretended to settle all in the Clayton-Bui wer treaty ; 
yet that treaty was a delusion and a snare. While that treaty was yet warm, 
England drives the Nicaraguan forces out of San Juan del Norte ; then she 
pirates that entrepot from an independent State ; anoints a hybrid savage as a 
kins; gives to a few Jamaica negroes, dressed like the Georgia major without 
his spurs, the constabulary baton, and builds a congeries of negro huts which 
she nicknames after the Earl Grey. She performs the same office for»Honduras, 
by what Clarendon called the "spontaneous settlement" of the Bay Island*; 
and then claims from us good faith in keeping the compact which she breaks ! 
Along comes Sir Gore Ouseley to maintain the delusion, in spite of Lord Napier, 
who goes home. What more ? She approves of the Cass-Yrissari treaty by 
fomenting difficulties in the way of its ratification. She pretends to Mr. Dallas, 
through Malmsbury, that Belly is a French adventurer for whotn she has no 
> sympathy ; yet, in acts, gives to him French and English protection, through 
the alliance. It is not safe to trust her. Her treaties are ropes of sand. Her 
international law is too elastic for use by any but herself. Her designs are 
steeped in fraud ; and all complications with her are dangerous and entangling. 
Thank God! we have a Secretary of State whose life is marked with signal 
ability in anticipating, demonstrating, and frustrating her designs. This nation 
will sustain him in his declaration that — 

" The establishment of a political protectorate by any one of the Powers of Europe over anv 
of the independent States of this continent, or, in other words, the introduction of a scheme of 
policy which would carry with it a right to interfere in their concerns, is a measure to which 
the United States have long since avowed their opposition, and which, should the attempt be 
made, they will resist by all the means in their power." 

Behind this rock the present Administration are intrenched. There is no 
feeling in this country worth calling patriotism, which does not stand squarely 
up to°this high and strong position! Why should not this Congress, by some 
definite action, stand bv the popular sense and the Government ? 1 am ready 
either to give the moral force of a resolution such as that now referred to the 
Committee of the Whole, to abrogate the Clayton-Bulwer treaty ; or I am ready 
to go further, and to clothe the President with extraordinary powers, and to 
give him means, or the authority to procure means, by which his recommenda- 
tions may be acted on and acted out. 

But it may be said, why so much risk of war with the combined powers of 
Europe; why so much anxiety for the Isthmus or Central American route? 
Not because we are in danger of being cut off from its dominion. That will 
come, if these Central American States remain independent of European con- 
straint. Not because.it is the only feasible mode of transit for the great orien- 
tal trade between the'oceans; for in time there will be rapid and safe transits 
on our own soil. Not so much because we ought to have and hold the hundred 
and fifty millions of trade with these Spanish American tropical lands, instead 
of but ten millions which we now have. But nature never made so narrow an 
obstacle; one so easily severed, and on which such great commercial and eco- 
nomical results depended, as that at Darien or Nicaragua. She buried moun- 
tains and valleys beneath the wave, to narrow that neck, and thus expand the 
bounds of interchange, and encircle the earth with a white zone of argosies. 

If New Granada shall be ours— as it should be, within a twelvemonth, unless 
the Congress of Bogota show more honesty and wisdom in settling the claims 
of our Panama sufferers, than is likely; if New Granada would follow the ad- 
vice of Gonzales, her attorney general, and enhance her interests by applying 
for admission to our Uuion; and if Venezuela would follow the wise inclina- 
tions of her patriot chief, General Paez, whose exile here has mad.' him love 
the land of his home the more for the prospect of uniting its fortunes with 
ours; then, indeed, these Central American States, now the football of 
European diplomacy, must either come to us, or be powdered into noth- 
ingness between the industrial movements of the surrounding States. Once 
let the agriculture of Venezuela be smiled upon by a protecting Govern- 
ment, and her magnificent ports would soon 'fill with the keels of her 



8 

elder commerce. Let northern energy blend with her undirected labor, 
and the gold mines of Upata would gleam with their olden treasures. Let 
Panama break from her vassalage to her irresponsible rulers, and that 
mart of the golden age of Spain and her viceroys will teem with a wealth 
which no buccaneers in a thousand caravels can bear away. These accom- 
plished, and the intermediate States of Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Salvador, Hon- 
duras, and Guatemela, will follow, as surely as the sheaf of the summer follows 
the seed of the spring. The trade of all tropical America would then fall to_ us 
naturally "by our proximity, and by the variety of our productions with which 
to barter. These tropical wastes ought to give us coffee, indigo, and cocoa, 
which are failing in India, as well as the cabinet woods, so much in demand. 
In return they will take our flour, pork, machinery, fabrics, and a thousand 
other articles which they need, and which every State of this Union produces. 
Our trade, which now counts its hundreds, will then count its millions. 

If this Congress has optic nerve enough to look a few years ahead, it will at 
least, start a policy that will secure all the isthmian highways which are so 
indispensable to our development and power. Its first duty is to repel every 
attempt of the remotest influence, come from what quarter it may, which may 
impede this procession of events or arrest our inevitable and legitimate aggran- 
dizement. "No nation with one harbor, much less a nation with a coast bestrewn 
with harbors like ours, can be long prosperous within, that does not prosper 
and grow without. When a State, which is commercial by situation, forgets 
the work of outbuilding its empire, it looses its inner vitality. The day that 
marks its failure to meet every rising opportunity of advancement abroad, 
marks its sure decline at home. As with the individual, so with the State ; if 
its ambition be dead and its hopes of expansion smoulder, its dissolution is 
speedy and sure. "While its intellectual and physical energies are tense and 
grasp a large range; its internal and foreign empire will become consummate 
because it has the everlasting law of growth! 

We have illustrated that law with reference to our southern neighbor, Mexico. 
The effete and wasted portions of Mexico, being one half of her area, lying 
next to us, became nutriment to our stalwart strength. The very dirt of the 
ground became assimilated with our energy, and lo ! from our Mexican pur- 
chases, $10,000,000 of gold per year are sucked into every conduit of American 
life, to enhance its happiness, and give added comfort to its homes. It was 
once objected, that the soil of California, New Mexico, and Arizona, was poor; 
a land of sand and centipedes; that there was no homogeneity in the people. 

True, she has six million Indians, with Spaniards in plenty and pride, and of 
mixed people not a few. But are they worse than the Indians of our own soil? 
On the contrary, they are far better. They are tractable, stout, and laborious. 
Spain managed them with but a handfull of soldiers for three hundred years. 
She managed them, too, under every provocation to revolt. Had an American 
protectorate been the sequence of Scott's occupation, a few months of protec- 
tion would have given their industry its reward and peace its blessing. Then, 
too, we should have no apprehension to disturb our present relations with 
Mexico. 

To these relations I propose to call the attention of the House. In the dis- 
cussion, I need only remark, historically, that on the discovery of this continent 
there was but one nation in North, and one in South America, which seemed 
to be possessed of any civilized advancement. Peru, under the Incas, whose 
white robes betokened the almost divine simplicity of the people; and Mexico 
with a society that was Arcadian in its simplicity, and a polity wonderful in its 
complications. The State, the priesthood, the cultivators of the soil, the rulers, 
and the ruled of Mexico, lived in peace under a lovelier sky than that of Na- 
ples, and a richer soil than th'at of ancient Latium. Let it be remembered that 
this prosperity and contentment were not alone the result of good laws, but of 
good land; of good manners, but of good mines. There was, in the Aztec 
tongue, no language of cupidity, though gold roofed the temple and jasper built 
the altar. 

I need not repeat that this isolated case of civilization on this northern con- 
tinent was mostly the result of the unparalleled climate and soil. That climate 







and soil remain. Three hundred years of misrule have not impaired the salu- 
brity of the one, nor detracted from the wealth of the othen _ 

The Spanish rule at length was thrown off for a Republic like ours. The 
inborn strength to throw it off, after so long a trial, showed a spirit of freedom 
which received its plaudits from this nation at the time. In February, 1821, at 
Ieualn, Mexico declared her independence. On the 4th of October, 1824, she 
adopted her constitution. England was first to recognize this progress, and as 
usual, for her profit. The lower clergy and the masses, consisting of Indians, 
were its creators and beneficiaries. The upper clergy never sympathized with 
this severance from Europe ; and until the revolution of Ayutla, contaminated 
by Comonfort^ they never became a power in politics. His policy torn Ilea their 
estates. They struck back. Hislaw of desamortizacion confiscated § 8,000,000 
of their property, which passed to private individuals. They struck back, even 
at this compromise confiscation. Commonfort reeled under their blow ; ^reeled 
from the Puros to the Moderados ; and from the Moderados to the Church 
and its conservative defenders, into whose arms he and his anti-Church policy 
fell ! We need not wonder at these changes, when we remember that a mag- 
nificent and organized hierarchy held $300,000,000 of property ; with a revenue 
of $20,000,000, being $5,000,000 more than the best annual Government revenue. 

Mr. Cushing said, at Richmond, that these party names of Liberal, Constitu- 
tional, Pure, Moderate, Central, and Federal, so often appearing in oar Mexican 
news, "were but the watchwords of contending factions, efficient alike only to 
waste their common country." Hardly true ; for it must be remembered that 
in Mexico, as in all nations, there will be parties founded on interest or .hope, 
conservative or radical, with intervening moderate shades. There is in Mexico, 
well-defined, a Central, Federal, or Conservative party, under whose rally men 
of wealth and of the Church, and of improgressive temperament naturally 
gather. This party would centralize power in the federal Government, and 
thereby become aggressive in the States. It would lean towards a strong 

fovernment; and hence its eye is ever on tradition and Spain. It would to-day 
ail Spain or France as its master to attain its end. Santa Anna, Zuloaga, and 
Robles have been its executive representatives. Miramon assumes tae same- 
position just now. The natural antagonists of this party are the Puros, the 
Moderados, Constitutionalists, Democrats, or call them what you will. Federal 
restraiut to them is irksome; Europe and kingcraft hateful; and the Church 
despotic and avaricious. In the language of Mr. Gadsden to Alvarez, in June 
1855 "thev would limit the central power to that alone which i r; and 

thus 'they should seek, like the United States, to grow without ani ISi into 
strength and prosperity." Their aspiration is for a republic like our o\\ a. They 
heed and deserve our symyathy. Juarez is their Executive— a pure Indian, 
whose descent is from Montezuma. Degollada is their general, and Mata, their 
minister, seeking recognition here. This party have a majority oi the States 
and nine-tenths of the people of Mexico with them. They have the revenues. 
They hold the ports. Their President is dejure and de facto Executive. A lit- 
tle more patience, Mr. Forsyth, and you would have recognized ■■! not 
(as you did) otherwise! I>e jure; for, by the constitution of Mexic , adopted 
by an extraordinary congress, at the Capitol, February 5, 1857, it was provided, 
by section seventy-nine, that — 

« In temporary default of a President of the Republic, and in the vacancy be* »re the instal- 
lation of the newly-elected President, the president of the supreme court oi justice shall eater 
apon the exercise of the functions of President." 

And, article thirty-two : 

"If f-ora whatever reason, the election of President shall not have been made and pub- 
lished by December 1st, upon which the change is to take place, or if the newlyelected is not 
able to enter promptly upon the exercise of his functions, the term ot thepr lident 

shall nevertheless cease, ami the supreme executive power shall bo deposited act interim in 
the president of the supreme court of justice." 

When, therefore, on the 11th of January, 1858, General Comonfort vacated 
the Presidency, the Constitution devolved the office upon Benita Juarez, the 
president of the supreme court of justice. De facto ; for he holds the held, 
and has the money and the masses. The federal army, it is true, was not at 



10 

his command. Felix Zitloaga was illegally named Dictator by a clique at the 
capital, January 22, 1858 ; and having the army, and holding the capital, Jau- 
rez transferred "the administration to Vera Cruz. There was no such officer 
known as Dictator, and Zuloaga has paid the penalty of usurpation by deposi- 
tion. There can be but one executive, and Robles, who assumed Zuloaga's 
place, was not that officer. The constitution under which Juarez acts is the 
only organic law, and that does not recognize the junta which elected Miramon, 
to whom Robles yielded his fasces. 

This constitution is the rallying cry of the Liberals ; to its defence the nation 
is com*iitted ; by it alone is order possible. To sustain its upholders is clearly 
the duty, as it is the interest and desire of the United States. President Buch- 
anan has well considered these facts. In the success of the constitutional party 
he places all his hopes of redress for the innumerable outrages to our citizens. 
If this party fail, and there "being abundant cause for a resort to hostilities 
against the Government now holding possession of the capital," I am ready, 
for one, to vote for any system of reprisal or to grant the Executive the neces- 
sary power to take possession of any portion of Mexico, as a pledge for the 
settlement of our claims. 

I say that I am ready to vote for such reprisal or occupation. But I have 
considered these parties in Mexico with the view of qualifying this declaration. 
I believe that it would be best, at once, to recognize the Juarez constitutional 
government, by the most solemn assurances of sympathy and protection. The 
late news makes this step imminently urgent. This can be done ; first, by the 
prompt recognition of Mata, who is here seeking such recognition ; second, by 
the sending of a naval force to the Gulf, where we are unrepresented. This 
force should be accompanied by a commissioner to treat with the Juarez gov- 
ernment'; to counteract the influence of the allied fleets now aiding Miramon 
and Robles, and threatening Juarez; and with the latter to cement an alliance, 
and to obtain such a settlement of our claims and difficulties as will comport 
with our interest and honor. I have the surest authority for saying that such 
on arrangement would give us, not only a firm union with Mexico, not only 
postal and extradition and right of way treaties, not only a foothold in the 
northern Mexican States, which can be made permanent without .war; but it 
would foil every attempt of the European alliance to control the affairs of Mex- 
ico. It would crush the Robles-Miramon government, elevate and organize the 
democratic American sentiment, and give us an alliance of peace, which is the 
precursor of a magnificent commerce! 

If, however, we seize Sonora and Chihuahua, without an understanding with 
the constitutional Government, what will be the result? Poor and miserable 
as is the condition of Mexico, she would likely declare war. Such a declaration 
would come from the Robles-Miramon faction. It would draw to that faction 
the strength of the nation. It would, perhaps, crush Juarez and his party, and 
leave us no better off than if we had pursued a more politic and pacific course. 

Again, if we delay to recognize the constitutional Government, it will soon 
be in power at the capital as it is in the provinces. It can then say to us, " Oh, 
yes ; you would not help us in our extremity, when your advantage should 
have prompted you, and your sympathy would have been of service. We can 
get along without your aid now. Touch not a foot of our soil, on the penalty 
of an endless difficulty." 

"Wisdom, interest, the law of American progress, and the predominance of 
our Union ou this continent, all urge the course I have indicated. Juarez waits 
our action. Shall we miss the golden opportunity? 

If we fail in our efforts with him, then I am willing at ouce to take Sonora 
and Chihuahua, whichever party succeeds. 

I believe that the list of American claims and cruelties, which has even pro- 
vokod the English press to wonder at our forbearance, is warrant enough for 
such possession. There are even yet higher ground for such seizure. The 
French Minister, De Gabriac, rules in the Miramon councils. A French fleet 
rides before Sacrificios. The French admiral was very ready to back Spain in 
her demands. To break this French power is our imperative duty. If it be 
notrbroken, our line of extension southward to Central America will be broken 
irrevocably. 



11 

Such is the condition of parties in Mexico. I need not discuss it farther. 
The contest now is between the democratic element aud the conservative ele- 
ment. The latter has its eye ever on Europe, and averse to the United States. 
Its rule has proved the most distracting and disastrous ever yet known in the 
annals of the South American Republics, where the earthquake and the revo- 
lution alike awake the same sad cry of anguish, and receive the same defiant, 
destructive answer. 

I need not have pictured this land of beauty and order as it was once, to 
heighten the contrast of its present condition. After thirty-eight years of de- 
bilitating spasms, we find, to-day, the spectacle of Mexico helpless, bleeding, 
dying; the Turkey of the western world ; and capable of no effort even of re- 
sistance to the Spanish fleet, much less to the French or English. Rapacity, 
crime, chaos, craft, license, aud brutality ; indolence only active to wrong; and 
industry quickened only for vice; laws made for their infraction, and order to 
be contemned. Mountain cries unto valley for relief; and from hacienda to 
city goes up the agony of despair. This is unhappy Mexico, in whose fate no 
nation ever cau have the interest we have till such a nation conquer us. Who 
shall intervene? 

Were it only the natives who suffered, we might stand aloof, and say, "they 
have made their bed; let them lie in it." But even this would be culpable in- 
difference. Good neighborhood does not thus do its office. The artisans of 
the city of Mexico are out of employment, and hungering for food. Let this 
one fact speak volumes ! In the three pawnbroking establishments of the city, 
called Monts de Piedad, the last year, there were 68,000 borrowers out of a 
population of 185,000; $912,000 were loaned, and $869,000 paid for its use. 
With an army of 11,700 men, of which 5,800 are officers, and a debt of 
§120,000,000, and an expenditure by two Governments ; with but one eighth 
qf her arable soil cultivated, and her mines unworked, or, if worked the trea- 
sures at the mercy of the red guerilleros who infest every avenue of intercourse ; 
with every one of her twenty-two States and six Territories parading an array 
of contending forces and ambitious guerilla chiefs; Garza aud Vidaurri con- 
ferring in the North to move down and check the Federalists of the interior; 
PesquTera about to move on Mazatlan; Alatriste on the plains of Apam; Cam- 
auon, from Metamoras de Izucar, waiting to beseige Puebla ; Blanco in Michoa- 
can; Iturbide in the Bahia; Marquez repulsed from the Puente Calderon, 
around which gather the combating forces under Miramon, Piocha, and Degolla 
da; Mejia defeated by the liberal forces under Pueblita and Huerta; the en- 
virons of the capitol swarming with the Liberal soldiery; this was the picture 
of a few days ago! 

The scene changes. The Federal chief Echeagaray betrays Zuloaga, and in 
collusion with llobles, makes the latter chief. Echeagaray in turn is imprisoned 
at Puebla; is about to be shot; when, lo! an insurrection in the eity of Mexico 
saves him, and Zuoloaga rushes to the English flag for protection. In this compli- 
cation, a junta is called to settle the difficulty; and who should be chosen but 
Miramon, a dashing young general, flushed with his successes over the Liberals, 
and who moves toward the city under the fluttering pennons of his calvary. 
Meanwhile, young Alvarez and Villava lead their speckled Pintos down on the 
warm lowlands for pillage ; while Juarez, dignified and statesmanlike, holds 
his rule in Vera Cruz, the commercial metropolis. Mexican conducta go down 
to the sea under the French flag, to get his revenues, to help one party by rob- 
bing the other; while the fleets of the three great nations of Europe gather on 
her coasts, and beg, from their gaping gun-mouths, the results of spent plunder! 
It is as if Dives should besiege Lazarus with a bowie knife And revolver, and bid 
him disgorge the furtive crumb, as indemnity for the past and security for the 
future!" Fifty generals and a nation of seven millions, not knowing what may 
be their fate! The Agiotistas hold the money and oppress with it. The gene- 
rals murder and pillage in gross, and the bandits in detail. Indians never be- 
fore in arms rush to them for self-preservation. Foreigners, ever at the mercy 
of these fickle fictions, find no protection in their flagB, and no hope hut in pas- 
sive submission to forced loans and open robbery. This is the spectacle of mu- 
tilated Mexico to-day. To-morrow it may be worse ! 



, 12 

I repeat it, who shall intervene ? Some one must. Our interest is paramount 
Why^ this interest? Not only our proximity to Mexico ; uot alone the number 
of our citizens domiciliated in the country; but a common interest in the de- 
velopment, the retouching, as it -were, into its primeval color and grace, of that 
elder beauty which Spain tarnished aud anarchs have torn to shreds. Our in- 
terest lies first in Mexico's erect and orderly independency. If that be no 
longer possible, then that no Power but our own shall guard its weakness and 
administer its estate. This is the only programme which this nation can tolerate, 
and by which it dare abide and survive or grow! 

As to our proximity: the reasons on this head for our intervention are well 
set forth in the President's message, I cannot add to pte force. I therefore 
quote it: 

" But there is another view of our relations with Mexico, arising from the unhappy condition 
of affairs along our southwestern frontier, which demands immediate aclion. In that remote 
region, where there are but few white inhabitants, large bands of hostile and predatory Indians 
roam promiscuously over the Mexican States of Chihuahua and Sonora, and our adjoining 
Territories. The local governments of these States are perfectly helpless, and are kept in a 
state of constant alarm by the Indians. They have not the power, if they possessed the will, 
even to restrain lawless Mexicans from passing the border and committing depredations on 
our remote settlers. A state of anarchy and violence prevails throughout that distant frontier. 
The laws are a dead letter, and life and property wholly insecure. For this reason the settle- 
ment of Arizona is arrested, whilst it is of great importance that a chain of inhabitants should 
extend along its southern border, sufficient for their own protection, and that of the United 
States mail passing in and from California. "Well-founded apprehensions are now entertained 
that the Indians and wandering Mexicans, equally lawless, may break up the important stage 
and postal communication recently established between our Atlantic and Pacific possessions. 
This passes very near to the Mexican boundary throughout the whole length of Arizona. I 
can imagine no possible remedy for these evils, and no mode of restoring law and order on . 
that remote and unsettled frontier, but for the Government of the United states to assume a 
temporarv protectorate over the northern portions of Chihuahua and Sonora, and to establish 
military posts within the same ; and this I earnestly recommend to Congress. This protection 
may be withdrawn' as soon as local governments shall be established in these Mexican States, 
capable of performing their duties to the United States, restraining the lawless, and preserving 
peace along the border." 

A temporary protectorate will effectually, if not nominally, give us these 
States of Sonora and Chihuahua. They are very sparsely populated, there be- 
ing about three hundred thousand persons to their two hundred and twenty- 
three thousand seven hundred and ten square miles. These lands are repre- 
sented as delightful in climale and rich in resources, agricultural and mineral. 
They have been described as the land of the blessed in Oriental story. Summer 
and winter, table land and valley, are nearer akin than in most places in the 
world. Silver is in their streams, — in lodes with crests elevated above the 
ground. Spain demonstrated their riches ; but the nomadic Apaehes swept 
over this Eldorado, and left but a memory ' of its treasures which American en- 
terprise is already vitalizing into a reality. 

Is it objected by southern gentlemen that these States must become free, and 
not slave States ? I hope not. You have been claiming your constitutional 
rights. Where is there a word about the equilibrium of the States in that in- 
strument? Under it you have equality of right, and no right of equality in the 
number of States. This equality is not of arithmetic, but of political ethics. 
The moment you claim equilibrium of States, that moment your honor is com- 
promised aud your loyalty to the Constitution is questioned. 

Do vou say, " We will' favor this protectorate if Tamanulipas and New Leon 
are included)" Very well ; try that. I will vote for it, or vote to include any 
other State where you think you can raise coffee and sugar, and can outvie 
with the North in the race of colonization and power. I will gladly vote for a 
protectorate over an independent federation of States north of the Sierra 
Madre. 

Mr. MILLSON. I want to know under what authority the gentleman from 
Ohio represents southern gentlemen as desiring all these Mexican States? 

Mr. COX. I have not so represented them. I say, southern gentlemen may. 
perhaps, not exactly wish to take Sonora and Chihuahua, lest they might be- 
come free States, and not slave States. It was a suggestion made to me by a 
southern member, and I said to him, " Come along ; we will put in Tamau- 
lipas and New Leon. We will link them hand in hand." For myself, I am 



13 

willing to give protection to northern Mexico; if not for annexation, for a free 
trade which will be of mutual advantage, and will be a practical absorption. 
It will at least prepare these States for admission. Let Monterey be the nucleus 
of Zacatecas, San Luis, Queretero, Tamaulipas, Coahuila, New Leon, Chihuahua, 
and Sonora — all the States between the Bio Bravo and the Gulf of California ; 
all natural allies in the interests of the United States. Let them cluster in upon 
our ensign — not star by star, but in a galax}-. By that you do at once what 
will in time be done by the natural laws of development. Besides, you raise 
our present feeble trade of seven millions to twenty-eight, which Great Britain 
enjoys. You can thus enhance every inch of soil, and every shining particle of 
ore, in these regions. 

Mr. GIDDIXGS. Will my colleague allow me to put a question to him? 

Mr. COX. No, sir; I have not time. We will meet and talk the matter 
over after my friend shall be made Governor. I do not wish to get out of the 
line of my argument. 

By this programme we shall have, in time, with all of Mexico, a practical an- 
nexation, which will allow free trade and safe intercourae, to our mutual ad- 
vantage. 

As to the question of protecting our citizens already in Mexico, and demand- 
ing reparation for wrongs done them, this should be a capital cause of inter- 
vention in Mexican matters. Senator Mason's bill is rightly predicated on this 
cause. If Spain could make the liberals pay for the murder and spoliation cf 
Spanish subjects at San Yincente, Chiconcuaque, Durango, and elsewhere, in 
Comoufort's time, why are we asleep over the rights of our citizens ? I have 
before me a list of these claims, but a very imperfect one. Each claim is a 
casus belli. Here are some dozen cases of illegal seizure of American property. 
I saw it noticed that some eleven millions were already calculated at our State 
Department. We have grievances beyond money. The sentences in relation 
to illegal marriages is a wrong to those without the established church, and de- 
grades to crime the holy relations of parentage and wedlock; the infamous sur- 
veillance of the post office over American letters, refusing to deliver even the 
United States consular correspondence unless it were first inspected by Mexican 
authorities; and worse still, the rude, cruel, and brutal arrest and imprison- 
ment of Chaplin, Stocker; Ainsi, and Garcia, are enough to make the Haynaus 
of Austria pale beside the imbruted and unbridled scoundrelism of Mexican 
officers. The story of Ainsi, seized on American so 1, sixteen months in the 
prisons of Sonora, wearing the barra de grillas ; and that sad, saddest of all 
stories, the massacre of his brother-in-law, Crabbe, and his confederates, whose 
characters have been blackened to rob their murder of its heinousness; these 
should move the very stones to sympathy. 

In this matter the United States have* but one duty. These sufferers were 
our citizens. Wherever that character of citizenship is to be found, the indi- 
vidual bearing it, is clothed with the nationality of the Union. Whoever the 
man may be, whether native-born, naturalized, or semi-naturalized, he can 
claim the protection of this Government. It may respond to that claim with- 
out being obliged to explain its conduct to any foreign Power; "for it is its 
duty to make its nationality respected by other nations and respectable in every 
quarter of the globe." This doctrine was illustrated in the Koszta case. What 
difference is there between a dungeon in Guayrnas, where Ainsi lay in chains, 
and the Austrian brig Iluzzar, which held the body or the Hungarian} 

The outrages upon our citizens are not confined to Mexico. In every Span- 
ish American State they are common. In Peru, in Paraguay, in New Gran- 
ada, in Cuba, in Costa-Rica, in all places where the slanders of t lie Madrid 
press against the "peddling traders of the North" enter, we have to meet per- 
secution, imprisonment, illegal seizure of property and person and an unwink- 
ing espionage; and that, too, under taunts more galling, because we know how 
easy it would be to punish such outrages. We should examine the list of 
claims on Spanish-American States to appreciate the divine forbearance of our 
inactivity. A settlement with Mexico would be a general settlement with 
Spanish America. 

This duty of intervention becomes at once imperative and dignified, when we 



14 

remember that, by such an act, -we do not only protect our citizens, but we 
save Mexico. We not only save her from Spain, France, and England, but from 
herself. This is no conquest of Cortez. It is the salvation of a people whose 
interests will be bettered by our aid. Without such aid, the fairest part of this 
continent will be a ruin — only the worse because, like the Parthenon, its frag- 
ments will remain to show the beauty and richness of its former condition. 

In conclusion, the policy I have indicated with respect to this continent, and 
the application of which to Cuba, Central America, and Mexico, will be of such 
benefit to them, will enable us to conform to that law of growth by which 
alone we have become great, and by which alone we shall become greater. 
This is the policy of other nations, and they have met obstacles to accomplish 
it. We shall accomplish it, but we shall have them as our obstacles. England 
has swept with her power from the Shannon to the Indus. She is content, and 
so are we, to see her greatness repeated in the offspring of her loins. Yet she 
daily calls our attempts to expand by the rudest terms. France has twice 
threatened Europe with continental conquest, aud now organizes the Arabs of 
Northern Africa, the granary of the Roman world, for her march upon Egypt 
and her domination of the Mediterranean. Russia, the great land animal, is 
piercing Asia at every vulnerable point with her lances, and is pressing for an 
empire of which there is no adequate prophecy in the Scriptures. Even Spain 
joins her arms and her priesthood with France, and is waging against Cochin 
China, a war which her journals call the civilizing spirit of the age, impelling 
the force of Europe to break down the barriers which divide that race from 
humanity. 

Yet all of these nations, except Russia, which has ever been kind and tolerant 
toward us, are this day in league to prevent the stretch of our influence over 
our continent. England, holding half of North America, is jealous of our 
growth, and Would choke us at the isthmian neck. France woidd crush out the 
sympathies of the white republic of St. Domingo for the United States, by her 
Chevalier Reyband, charge at Hayti ; and she used that burlesque of emperors 
and that ape of manhood, Soulouque, to Africanize the island, to overthrow 
Santa Ann3, and to break down the Cazenau treaty for a free port and steam 
depot, and for advantages to our citizens in the mines, sugar lands, and mahog- 
any forests of that island! France again appears in the Sandwich Islands; at 
the Isthmus, with M. Belly; and at last in Mexico, aiding the Spaniards, and in 
sympathy with the Spaniards of Cuba, to foil us in every attempt to adjust our 
national relations with that country. Every steamer brings us a lecture from 
Exeter Hall on our slave propagandist fillibusterism. And may we not go for 
its commentary to Copenhagen, to Ionia, to Gibraltar, to Malta, to the Cape of 
Good Hope, to the Rod Sea, to Jamaica, to New Zealand, to China, and to the 
sheiks of all India. Why, the British regime in India was a system of torture 
more exquisite than regal or spiritual tyranny ever before devised. The Sepoys 
vainly tried to copy its atrocities. 

Were we left alone, we might be content tp let France alone. No American 
would whisper a " nay " to her making the Mediterranean a French lake. Her 
genius and vivacity can make its waves glow with the light of other days. 
That sea on which navigation had its birth — the maritime world of Greece, 
Carthage, Rome, Tyre, Sidon, Turkey, Egypt, Persia, Venice, and Genoa — the 
sea of Homer and "David, Jonah and St. Paul, Ulysses and Neptune ; washing 
the base-of Ararat and Olympus ; with a world's history on its bosom, and 
whole nations in its bed ; the American can well say, let its guard be the gallant 
sons of France! He could say it without envy, and with heartiness, if France 
would keep her navies out of the Gulf of Mexico and the harbor of San Juan. 
We have made no remonstrance against England on her ceaseless round of 
empire — bloody, cruel, and rapacious as it has been — subsidizing the riches of 
Asia to her commerce and her greed. We know the law by which these power- 
ful white races move. It will "be irresistible. France, England, and Russia, are 
tending to a common focus at the Isthmus of Suez, as France, England, and the 
United States are at Darien. Starting from opposite points, extra-European 
conquest converges here! Eugland 6eeks passage across Egypt or Syria, for 



15 

India and Australia, and pounces on Perira at the mouth of the Red Sea — as 
she did on Gibraltar and San Juan. France, marching her army of Algeria, 
presses toward the prize to realize the great Napoleon's dream oi Egypt, and 
urges her canal at Suez as she is striving to do at Nicaragua. Russia, seini- 
o-riental, marches through Western Asia and Persia down upon the confines of 
English power and French ambition, and finds her rivals in the field. What 
fine reproaches they can hurl at each other and at us, for the lust oi' dominion, 
when they gather at this focus of theformer civilization! What shocks of con- 
tending torces will there and then be encountered 1 Let them come and strive. 
Let Russia push its caravans across the steppes of Tartary until the trade of 
Kiaehta and Irkantsh rival Canton and Shanghai. Let France divorce Asia 
from Africa by marrying the Red sea to the Mediterranean at Suez. Let Eng- 
land work its iron way to India from Beyrout to the Euphrates. Let the steam 
engine labor for the millions of Asia under any engineer; but let America alone 
in her armies of occupation to open the Isthmus, and control the steam and 
commerce center of our own hemisphere. 

No change of dynasty, or of form of government, can check this ultimate 
condition of European expansion and collision. Such a change may affect the 
relations of these countries to ourselves. The illiberal policy of France to this 
country niay return to plague its inventor, the usurper of France. 

I have never heard his hated name since the 2d of December, that I could 
repress the prayer, which now 1 pray with something of a Red Republican fer- 
vor, that France may have barricades on the Boulevards ; the throne in llames, 
as that of Louis Philippe in the Place du Carousel ; the dynasty he seeks to 
perpetuate cut off, or flying from the rage of a Red Republic ; more citizens and 
less soldiers, and both fraternizing to the music of the Marseillaise; exile3 re- 
turning from their homes in pestilential swamps, amidst gay and festive wel- 
come ; prisons breaking ; the press free ; the Palais Justice open, and the tri- 
color of a new Republic flashing from every part of France and topmost on the 
Hotel de Yille, made sacred by the heroic eloquence of Lamartine. This would 
be a fit retribution from God for crimes and perjuries ; and not at all unfit as ' 
the reward of an intermeddling policy with the republican interests of the New 
World! 

Let us be decided ! These European Powers cannot, and do not, have peace. 
The bugles of truce sounded at the conference of Paris. Heralds proclaimed 
peace in every capital. But the war harness is not off. It is burnished anew, 
and tha weapons within reach! England, trembling at the one huudred thousand 
soldiers across the channel, and the naval wonders at Cherbourg, commences to 
build coast defences. Russia acquires Villa Franca, and stirs insurrection in 
Ionia against England. Mazzini issues his rescript to the secret socielies and 
Republicans of Italy to be ready and one as the thought of Italy and 
The coin of "Emanuel, the King of Italy," is circulated through the* peninsula. 
An actress moves the people of Venice to insurrection by a recitative which 
reminds them of their patriotism. Austria arms, and Piedmont proposes to 
repel. France sends more troops to Rome. Austria growls. France obtains 
from the Swiss a strong strategic post, and Austria growls agaiu. Naples in- 
sults Napoleon to please Austria, England writes bitterly against Naples, and 
does not spare the prosecutor of Montalembert. England shakes with a new 
reform movement — John Bright striving to Americanize her by popular sover- 
eignty. Turkey is unsettled in Europe and in Asia. Russia moves on, immense 
and great — the envy of all. A lighted match may flash this magazine into a 
terrific blaze, whose thunder will make all Europe quake. The" alliances of 
to-day, in Europe, for her own balance of power, may be dissolved by a popular 
breath to-morrow. As a consequence, they, cannot be relied on to pursue us to 
any fatal end. 

Already England has pushed this alliance with France to its snapping point. 
The English ] leople will not permit their aristocracy to carry it so far as to 
make it an offence to the people of this commercial nation. Not but that the 
English Government would like to aid France in checking our career; but trade 
is powerful for peace, and peace with us means cotton in England Let Eng- 
gland find cotton elsewhere, and our southern friends may be assured that her 




1fi UBRORV OF.CONGRKS 

:i 

intercourse -with us -will be no longer peaceful, 
themselves either, that cotton is their peculiar at 
every appliance to reach central China? To clot IPBWW*™ ib,1 ™ i ( qq""-m2 4 
millions of Chinese ? No. They are thus clotl: 011 » yo JW -, 
which is the stupendous growth of their own gi — # ~c"uai valley, estimated 
now to produce more than double the cotton raised in all our southern Statea 
put toe-ether. This vallev being England's, Manchester and Stockport can snap 
their finders at Charleston and Mobile, and English audacity will begin a new- 
career of rapacity and insolence towards us. Her jealousy of us is intus et 
in cute. 

Our re1i.ar.ee must be on our own strength and growth. If we cannot enact 
the Monroe doctrine into international law, we can create and consecrate it as a 
national sentiment. Let it be the national genius. Let it be the power of 
Aladdin's lamp. You remember the story. The old lamp from its friction 
evoked from the cave a mighty spirit; awed by its terrors, the poor youth only 
ventured at first to employ its powers in familliar affairs ; but gradually accus- 
tome 1 to its presence, he employed it to construct palaces, to amass treasures, 
to baffle armies, to triumph over foes, to wield the elements of air, light and 
heat, until, at the close of the story, the poor youth becomes the sovereign of a 
peaceful empire assured to his remote posterity ! 

This story, Mr. Speaker, is the type of our political genius. By it we have 
fortified ourselves in our domestic interests. Our domestic and territorial policy 
is fixed under its guidance. It is the instrument of that progress which must 
keep pace with steam and telegraph, until we are assured of an empire with 
which kingcraft dare not meddle; or meddling, find it a power to baffle its 
force of arms, and its fraud of diplomacy. We have become a Colossus on this 
continent, with a strength and stride that will and must be heeded. "With our 
domestic policy as to local governments established, we can go on and Ameri- 
canize this continent, and make it what Providence intended it should become, 
by a perpetual growth and an unsevered Union — the paragon in history, for 
order, harmony^ happiness, and power! 



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